Friday, February 6, 2015

A Belgian Whitbeer brew is in the works

Before I brewed my Oktoberfest, I made sure to have an ale in the works. Everyone has been asking me to make a Belgian Whitbeer. I am not a huge fan of the wheat beers in general as I find them to be a little too tart for my liking, but I didn't want to let all my buddies down. So to all of you who have been asking for a Belgian... it's in the works. Naturally, I didn't want to make a plain Jane recipe so I decided on a Honey Wheat Belgian, brewed with barley and wheat extracts,  2lbs of clover honey, orange peel, coriander and lightly hopped. Sounds good to me, let's see what the fans have to say.
2/22/15- My apologies, the title of this brew is actually called Honey Weizen, which technically has German background, I modified it though to resemble a Whitbeer of Belgian decent with the orange peel and corriander seeds. Either way, I tasted it last night while bottling it and it has a really nice honey aroma, a bit of sweetness from the honey, orange and coriander and a warming feel from the extra alcohol attributed to the honey. I'm looking forward to the final conditioned product.

Oktoberfest Lager

Well I finally took the jump/challenge. I brewed my first lager. Oktoberfest is a traditional German style lager. It is always brewed as a lager and as a typical homebrewer, I do not have a dedicated refrigerator to use for lagering to keep the temp's down in the 45-50 degree range needed for lagering. Luckily, being that it is winter time, I have a room in my basement that isn't heated and the temps are right in the range for lagering. YEAH!! So the brew is now in primary fermentation and we have to wait and see how the first lager experiment works out.

UPDATE: 04/29/15

Well the verdict is in, after a LONG aging process in my basement over 3 month at around 40 degrees, I finally bottled my first lager. After a one week conditioning period, the initial verdict is so-so. The Oktoberfest pours a dark brown color and has a dark malty backbone, which is typical of this style. My only concern is the carbonation level is pretty low. I am almost certain that with time, this beer will only get better. therefore..I will let it condition some more and give it another shot.